Elmhurst Woman Assaulted In Downtown Dallas

ELMHURST, IL – A marathon runner from Elmhurst was assaulted during the busy morning rush hour a few months ago while jogging in downtown Dallas.

Kristin and Sean Dailey were in Dallas on April 18 when she decided to go on a run. She was waiting to cross a train platform.

"All of a sudden, I felt this pain," Kristin told a Dallas group in a video. "A homeless person came up behind me, and as I was waiting, he hit me."

Sean said his wife got knocked unconscious.

"She was sucker-punched by a 240-pound guy, and she weighs 100 pounds," Sean said.

"Once I came to," Kristin recalled, "I got up and touched my face and saw blood and saw the man just turn the corner and walk away like it was no big deal."

She said she suffered injuries to her nose, chin and mouth.

"He could have hit her in the temple and killed her," said Sean, a former police officer.

Kristin said in the video, "The police knew exactly who (the suspect) was once I started describing him. They said they had other incidents with him in the last few weeks."`

After the incident, Kristin said she was told that someone should have warned her that it was unsafe on the train platforms.

"This is 8 a.m. in broad daylight," she said. "There were so many people on the street that this was not a place or time where I thought I needed to be so vigilant."

That night, the Daileys said they went to dinner and spoke to two people who said homeless people had attacked them before.

The Daileys said Dallas leaders needed to recruit more officers for greater pay.

"Dallas is a great city, and you're going to lose that if you allow crime to continue," Kristin said.

The couple appeared in a three-minute video with Dallas Hero, a group calling for officials to take greater action against crime.

After the attack, police arrested 29-year-old Kevin DeWayne Simmons, who was said to have told officers that God told him "to hit the lady," Dallas' ABC affiliate reported. Simmons was charged with misdemeanor assault.

In an email to Patch on Wednesday, Sean said he and his wife want to get the word out, so people can be safe.

"We have four young kids and want to raise awareness for others to stay alert and never let their guard down, because what happened to Kristin could happen to anyone at any time," Sean said.

He expressed unhappiness with the charge.

"My frustration remains that the case was treated as a misdemeanor rather than a felony, despite the seriousness of the assault," he said. "I pushed the Dallas County (assistant district attorney) for the strongest sentence possible within those limits."